MS Monopoly Deepening in Korea

For a nation that prides itself as a high-tech utopia, the land of fancy third-generation (3G) phones, wireless broadband and citizen-driven media, it's amazing how South Korea continues to invent new ways to be held hostage by a single corporation ― Microsoft.

It's now old news that Korean users of Chrome, Firefox, Opera and other non-Internet explorer browsers can't bank or purchase products online and are even disabled from interacting with e-government sites, since all encrypted transactions on the Web must be done through Microsoft's ``Active-X'' controls.

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To receive I-Pin, users are required to download a keyboard security module that prevents the codes from being intercepted. However, the program can only be installed through Active-X controls, forcing users of non-Microsoft browsers to convert to Internet Explorer.

Public key certificates, which are required in the process of producing I-Pin numbers, are also reliant on Active-X controls.

Critics claim that the government has once again compromised consumer rights for corporate convenience.  ``We admit that I-Pin represents a problem in terms of Web compatibility,'' said an official from the Korea Information Security Agency (KISA).

``There is nothing we can legally do about it for now, but we will try to improve in terms of consumer convenience and providing a fair environment for competition between companies,'' he said.

Continued Korean reliance on Active-X, a program used to install software components on Web pages to enable particular functions, is curious since Microsoft is moving to phase out the tool over compatibility issues and security concerns.

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